


Twenty-four Dollars in a Coffee Can

by gwyllion



Category: Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-02
Updated: 2009-12-02
Packaged: 2017-11-27 19:18:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/665515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gwyllion/pseuds/gwyllion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This was written for the Thanksgiving Challenge.  Thank you, oceansbetween, for your inimitable style.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Twenty-four Dollars in a Coffee Can

**Author's Note:**

  * For [oceansbetween](https://archiveofourown.org/users/oceansbetween/gifts).



The dime rested on her fingertips, shining in the sun, warm to the touch from lying on the sidewalk all day. _“You keep it, you saw it first,”_ the minister’s daughter said. _“At least, I think you did.”_

She put it in her pocket.

Although the day had ended, her work had not. She draped a quilt over her snoring husband and checked on the children. The three of them slept soundly, their bellies full.

On some days there was not enough food for them to eat, still they laughed and played, their makeshift toys wrought out of dunnage. K.E. and Ennis pretended to be cowboys and Indians, Ellen pretended to be a teacher, dressed up in her Mama’s shawl with shoes too big for her feet. Their joy grew from simple things. 

Money was no object if you never had any to spend. 

Thanksgiving. The Sage Methodist Church hosted a turkey dinner for the poor. The boys helped themselves to seconds, plates piled high with white meat, stuffing, squash, mashed potatoes, and cranberry sauce, while she cut the pies into even slices with her only daughter. She and her husband would never be able to provide a meal so decadent, with sweet desserts, rich gravy, and fat gobs of butter for the rolls that were always absent from the Del Mar table. 

_Don’t be jealous,_ she told herself.

She made sure her children ate their fill. The chocolate chip cookies, brownies, and cakes. No food like this at their run down two-mortgage ranch, of course, but she was grateful for the charity on his special day. 

At home, she could only prepare what she had the means to make herself. 

A loaf of bread. Hard boiled eggs. Carrots pulled from the ground. An occasional chicken killed with her bare hands. 

She gathered the children and bid goodbye to her fellow parishioners. The sky was clear as they exited the church. A bitter wind reddened her cheeks. She touched her palm to her face warding off the cold. 

Down the steps to the sidewalk. Toward the truck parked in the lot across the street. She caught the glint of the silver in the corner of her eye. She thought no one saw her when she stooped to pick up the coin, dropped by a downtown shopper or lost by a passing worshipper.

She took the dime from the pocket of her dress. In the kitchen, they kept a coffee can, adding to it when they had the good fortune to do so. As she had done for the past seventeen years, she dropped the coin in among the others. She would keep adding to the can, copper and silver.  
Her dreams gathered within. She smiled thinking of the treasures she could buy, for herself and for her family. Someday. 

She counted her blessings that the minister’s daughter urged her to tuck the coin into her pocket. _“You keep it.”_

She pushed the can back onto the shelf, pausing to consider the weight of her dreams. 

Must be more than twenty dollars in there now.


End file.
